John Wooden's Lessons In Leadership

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John Wooden is arguably the most successful coach in UCLA’s basketball history. While at UCLA he coached the Bruins into twenty-one first place standings, and ten NCAA championships. In addition, while the Bruins were not victorious in all of their championship matches, when they did not win they came in 2nd or 3rd. For John Wooden, or Coach Wooden, success however was not measured by the amount of victories nor losses. Instead, Coach Wooden measured his success based off of the team’s effort leading up to the game, during the game, and after the game. In “Wooden on Leadership,” Wooden writes about his accomplishments as a coach, mentor, and educator. Wooden divides his book into the following three sections, Pyramid of Success, Lesson on Leadership, …show more content…
Wooden leaves his reader with twelve lessons to consider when running an organization. Out of the twelve suggestions, the few that resonate most with leadership most desired in a higher education include but is not limited to “Call yourself a Teacher, Emotion is Your Enemy, Little Things Make Big Things Happen, & Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”. Calling yourself a teacher means understanding the importance of roles, and understanding when to switch between roles based on what behaviors are being demonstrated. Roles he refers to include teaching, counseling, organizer and role model. He ends on the principle that a leader must lead by example in order for others to follow. “Emotion is Your Enemy” conveys this idea that effectiveness as a leader comes at the cost of understanding how and when to control emotions. Controlling emotion put emphasis a culture that devalues certain emotions in the workplace and idealizes emotions like direction and aggression. “One must control their emotions and keep emotions under control” is the basis of the principle. Finally, “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” applies directly to the work of student affairs professionals because it reminds people of the importance of preparation. Preparation is the key to success therefore, not preparing is a set up to fail. This rule is one of the only rules Wooden never changed or modified in all of his years as a coach. He poses the question leaving readers to ponder how effectively time is being

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